


Bend but Never Break

by Mythologylover123



Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age - All Media Types, Dragon Age II, Dragon Age: Inquisition, Dragon Age: Origins
Genre: Angst and Tragedy, Angst with a Happy Ending, Childhood Trauma, F/F, F/M, M/M, Multi
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-08-24
Updated: 2020-08-24
Packaged: 2021-03-06 14:42:07
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,748
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26080609
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mythologylover123/pseuds/Mythologylover123
Summary: Bending meant survival.Breaking meant death.What they don't tell you about are the fates worse than death. The silent, suffocation of a joyless life. Of existence without value. Without love.Replaceable.That's all Zevran ever was.
Relationships: Zevran Arainai/Isabela, Zevran Arainai/Leliana, Zevran Arainai/Rinna, Zevran Arainai/Rinna/Taliesen, Zevran Arainai/Taliesen
Comments: 1
Kudos: 1





	Bend but Never Break

His earliest memory was of hunger, a deep and biting pain that started in his stomach and spread in tendrils all over his body. Zevran hadn’t eaten in roughly a week and his small body shook with the deprivation. He and his peers were covered from head to toe in grime as they went about their chores, cleaning the brothel: doing the laundry, scrubbing the floors, the pots, and the walls. Getting rid of the stench and filth as their bony hands shook with the lack of nourishment. 

This was not the first time this has happened and it would not be the last. 

His mother was a Dalish elf from a clan that abandoned her when she was impregnated by an alienage-bound elven woodcutter. With no other option, she joined a seedy brothel in a bad part of Antiva city. Zevran was born shortly after, and as quickly she came, she was gone. Rendered dead by child labor, and Zevran was left behind as inherited property of the brothel. 

Zevran had nothing, the other children, both female and male, had similar fates. The only difference was that most of them still had their mothers to care for them and place them as higher priority for nourishment and care. 

A fate that was not bestowed upon Zevran. 

Not that, in that moment, it mattered. Money had ceased coming into the brothel for several weeks now. Satinalia, with all it’s charm, left the seedy brothel wanting for nothing more than a few coins. A week of feasting and indulgence, followed by a week of fasting and abstinence. The usual customers paid for courtesans opposed to whores during the week of indulgence, and now they all spent a week in abstinence. It didn’t help that the whores also spent a great deal of money on frivolous goods and celebration during Satinalia. 

The whole brothel suffered. 

He scrubbed the walls as his hands trembled and his head spinned. He scrubbed until the job was done and then he went to lay down under the stairs in the back room, a small place of comfort. Lined with blankets accompanied by pillows and small bags that each child owned. 

Zevran crawled into the far corner space and curled up under his favorite blanket, getting comfortable while he thrust his hand into his wool bag containing the extra set of rags he called clothes, a few rocks he thought were pretty, some dried flowers from spring, and a pair of beautiful halla leather dalish-style gloves. 

He put the pure white gloves close to his chest, near his heart. 

“ Mami, te extraño,” he whispered his longing and his hunger with his eyes closed, “tengo mucha hambre” 

The elfling launched into a quiet prayer to his mother, one that he uttered with every day that passed. A prayer that told of his pain and his everyday life and action. He kept her updated through the thick and thin, and the gloves… they were the connection to her. The line that kept her listening, that made her spirit float from the Fade to be with him. 

When he had the gloves, he had her. They could not be separated. All that was left of her was him and the Dalish gloves. 

The only item that Zevran cared about was the gloves. With the gloves, anything was possible. With the gloves, he had his mother. He had his guidance, he had his heart. 

He needed her like he needed air. She watched over him through the gloves, he was certain of it. Otherwise the gloves would have been sold by the whores of the whorehouse long ago, but by some act of benevolence, the wenches let the orphaned toddler keep them. A benevolence only bestowed by spirits and hearts long passed. 

He whispered to the gloves, to his mother, every pain and suffering. Every joy and facet of life that he experienced. 

“Lo siento, Mami” He whispered an apology to his mother, “Debo robar” 

He kissed the gloves before he placed them with care back into the wool sack, hid it in his special corner, and then snuck out of the brothel through the back door. 

The young elfling wound through the dirty streets of his part of the city as he headed toward the more wealthy sectors. He snuck through alleyways, pointed ears astute to all the sounds around him. He avoided certain alleyways and vendors until the temptation of a pastry struck him deeply. 

He stared at it for a good few minutes from the shadows of an alley and watched the seller akin to the way a lioness stalks a zebra. 

When a young woman with four young children approached the seller’s booth, Zevran struck. He hid amongst her children, pulling his hair around his ears to cover his heritage from immediate view. 

As the children moved around her, pointing their grubby hands toward various sweets and foods and complaining loudly, distracting both her and the vendor, he seized the small pastry and shoved it down his shirt. 

Nobody was the wiser, and he snuck back into the alleyway shadows, quick as he came. He shoved the pastry into his mouth and closed his eyes, savoring the taste as he finished it immediately. 

The golden elfling was not aware of the hooded figure watching him closely, a small smirk playing on his lips as the seven year old scarfed down his stolen treat. 

He had promise and had already proven he was cunning. 

The figure watched him and decided he would be a cheap purchase. All skin and bones, the elfling’s ribs poked through his thin rags. The boy’s mannerisms were crude and had a quiet, cutting edge to them. They spoke of failed parenting and paired with the long, sharp ears far from the safety of the Antivan alienage, the assassin decided he was likely the son of a whore. 

Whores often sold their offspring to the Crows for a small fee. 

The Crows loved whorehouse children, they were already open minded to bedroom ideals and desperate. Desperate for anything they could get their hands on. Crow training was a mercy to them, and dying by the hands of their peers or masters was a kinder fate than by disease. 

When Zevran started to wind back through the underbelly of the city, through the filthy and scrappy streets, the assassin followed from the rooftops. When the elf snuck back into the backdoor of the brothel, the figure nodded with a small smile. He was right. 

The figure slid down from the rooftops, waltzing into the brothel with dignity only a man of political standing can possess, “Cuánto por el elfo de color dorado?” He demanded to know the price of Zevran to one of the men who worked the front of the brothel. 

“Tres de oro pagarán su deuda” 

Three sovereigns were as cheap as they came, the figure got paid more to steal a loaf of bread than Zevran was worth. 

“Quiero examinarse primero” He demanded before the male greeter darted into the back room and seized Zevran by the arm. 

The golden haired elfling made a noise of protest but ultimately kept his mouth shut, he knew better than to argue. Arguing earned you beatings. Vicious ones sometimes. 

He held his wool bag close to his chest as he was dragged into the front room where the hooded man waited for him. 

His dark brown eyes pierced Zevran’s gold ones and then roamed all over his body, from top to bottom. 

The male greeter set him in front of the assassin, prodding him closer with a gentle shove to the back. 

“Su nombre es Zevran” The male greeter said. 

Zevran swallowed as the strange man shoved his fingers into his mouth to check over his gums. The pressure he used was harsh and the calluses on his palm rubbed against Zevran’s chin. 

“Desvistase” Zevran was ordered. 

Zevran blanched but did as he was told, stripping out of the worn rags he called clothes until he stood before the man as naked as the day he had been born. 

He shivered, his ribs poking through his skin in an unnatural way. The baby fat of youth was mostly gone, but a little bit still clung to his face making it round. 

He was absolutely exposed. 

The figure checked over him, poking and prodding every now and then as if the elfling was nothing more than livestock. 

Eventually he nodded and Zevran put his rags back on, tucking his wool sack into his shirt as he did so. 

The man passed three Sovereigns over to the greeter. 

“Compradi”

And with that, Zevran was considered purchased. 

The man grabbed Zevran by the hand, dragging him away from the only world he had ever known. His hands were rough and covered in hard calluses that scraped across the smooth skin of Zevran’s bony arm. 

Zevran only looked back for a moment, long enough to see the coins of his purchase deposited in a hole in the wall, before the door was slammed shut and that world was gone.

From the alleyway a small child-like shriek cried out, “Zev!” as the slap of bare feet hit the worn dirt surrounding the brothel. A small girl with dark hair littered with grime ran out in front of the pair and tackled Zevran in a hug,  “ [ te voy a extrañar ](https://www.spanishdict.com/translate/te%20voy%20a%20extra%C3%B1ar) !” 

Zevran hugged her back and began to feel the familiar weight of a sob bubbling in his throat as it threatened to spill. His golden eyes filled with tears, “Te echaré mucho de menos” He sobbed into his childhood friend’s shoulder. They had always been together, as long as Zevran could remember. They shared his favorite blanket on chilly nights and would help one another with their chores before gallivanting off into the jungle-like forests of Antiva in the summer. She was a friend. She never mocked him for speaking to his gloves and she always hugged him after a beating. 

She was the only kindness he knew, and as the poised figure of the man yanked Zevran away from her and continued down the street, his tears flowed freely and he cried out to her, “Volveré a verte!” 

The girl called back to him with childlike empty promises. All of which the poised man knew well enough. 

Promises built on hope were empty. 

One does not feel friendship, love, or acceptance in the Guild of the Antivan Crows. 


End file.
